Sartre’s Theory Of "Others"

Sartre’ s existentialist philosophy has a wide influence in the world.”Existence precedes essence"and "Hell is other people" are his two most representative sayings.His discussion of others is mainly embodied in the Part III of Being and Nothingness.The background of WWII makes Sartre’s view of others pessimistic and even desperate.In the final analysis,what Sartre talks about others is about the question of being.On the basis of criticizing and inheriting Kant,realist,Husserl,Hegel and Heidegger’s philosophical theories,Sartre put forward his theory of "others" from a new perspective,and discussed the concrete relation between self and others on the basis of others.Sartre believes that his advantage over previous philosophers lies in his discussion of the relation between self and others in the relation between existence and existence.Sartre admits that people do not exist in isolation in the world,there are others besides me.I am not someone else.In Being and Nothingness,Sartre spends great effort in discussing others.Others occupy an important position,especially in Part III,Chapter III,discussing the concrete relation with others.Sartre describes how I coexist with oth ers and claims that the relation with others is necessarily conflicting.Firstly,Sartre criticizes Husserl,Hegel and Heidegger’s philosophical discussions on others.Sartre denied Husserl’s method of giving the existence of others from transcendental ego,believing that it was the being of others that made me experience selfness possible;Sartre affirmed Hegel’s concern for existence in the relation between master and slave,but regretted that Hegel finally identifies knowledge and existence with absolute spiritual entity;Sartre affirmed that Heidegger first discussed this co-existence with others at the level of ontology.However,Sartre believed that Heidegger’,s Mit-sein did not explain how it was possible to co-exist with others,but instead made others impossible.Secondly,Sartre believed that my encounter with others began with "Look",I am ashamed of myself as I appear to the other".In addition,Sartre explained the role of the body.He believed that when I encounter someone who objectifies me,others show me by the body.The facticity of my body is revealed to me through the attention of others.Finally,Sartre discussed the concrete relation with others through examples of love and sexual relations,revealing that the relation with others is essentially conflict.The phrase "Hell is other people" appears in Sartre’s drama Incarceration,which was written at the same time of the publication of Being and Nothingness.It openly exposes the conflict between self and others.However,it is misunderstood by some critics that Sartre is a "pessimist" and"hates others".In fact,Sartre encourages people to grasp their own possibilities,make positive changes,mediate relations with others and realize human freedom by revealing the irreconcilability of such conflicts with others.In Existentialism is a Humanism,Sartre holds that the meaning of"existence precedes essence"lies in that man can choose himself.Because man is condemned to be free,the freedom of others limits my freedom.However,Sartre did not let people do nothing,but encouraged people to take responsibility and act actively.Sartre’s discussion of others does not stop at the simple conflict of consciousness between me and the other.I coexist with others as "we",which is a collective body and constitutes a group for some common interests or goals.In The Critique of Dialectical Reason,Sartre endows the individual with historical significance.Individual people are connected with the group.In the group,the members of the group are the third person.Everyone’s power is endowed by other people as the third person.They confront each other.At the same time,the individuality of the individual is suppressed by the group and becomes the common individual.Emmanuel Levinas,a French philosopher at the same time as Sartre,believes that western philosophy is subject-centered philosophy,and that the subject is essentially a self-subject,which completely suppresses the otherness of others.Therefore,he vowed to defend the subject,take the other as the base,and establish the subject status of the other in the field of ethics.Both French philosophers inherited the methodologies of German phenomenology and had similar philosophical starting points.They also innovatively gave different perspectives of others understanding in their philosophical thinking,-which was comparable.In the comparison and analysis of the two theories,the significance of Sartre’s theory of "others" is clearer.